Current free education not education at all – Mwansa
By Tony Nkhoma
IT IS a shame for the United Party for National development (UPND) to cram classrooms with children and start clapping as an achievement, the Zambia We Want (ZWW) has said.
Interim president Ernest Mwansa told The Mast in an interview the free education policy under the UPND was a completely failed project.
“Free education is a failed policy. The UPND must have first addressed the issue of expanding education infrastructure and employing more teachers,” Mwansa said.
He said the policy was now a serious threat to the quality of education being offered to children in the country.
“I don’t know whether this free education provides that kind of free education to Zambians today. I very much doubt if it does that. To crowd these classrooms with individuals should not be a source of pride,” Mwansa said.
He said free education had complicated the education system by bringing more problems than it had failed to address.
“How can you expect quality students and quality graduates from those institutions where people are packed like sardines? We should be ashamed,” Mwansa said.
He said education had to have quality if the country was to swim out of poverty.
“So, if we want to do free education, can we see the building of new schools so that these pupils can go into classrooms where they feel respected and where the integrity is not tattered by overcrowding?” Mwansa said.
He said President Hakainde Hichilema and the UPND were laughable.
“But let me add to that the fact that true free education will help this country develop. Not packing students in classrooms where there is no space. If we really want free education, let’s begin by expanding our infrastructure in the education system so that we can give quality education to our children,” Mwansa said.
He said the current education standards in the country would only allow children to pass through grades without understanding anything because no education was taking place in its real sense.
“How many people are just running through these grades and they have barely learned anything? UPND should clearly explain this free education policy,” Mwansa said.
The free education policy has been one of subjects of self-praise by the UPND and Hichilema but critics have condemned the hasty manner in which it was enforced.
